Author Archive
The idea is to find your way out of the cave, your only weapon being the torch you’re carrying. I don’t want to give away the story yet, but I think it’s quite interesting, an based on an idea I had over 15 years ago!
1 day left and I still haven’t written a line of code. Going great!
For Ludum Dare, the 48-hour game compo.
I go through this a lot, losing faith with projects, getting it back, losing it again… Sometimes it results in finished work, the rest of the time it results in stress only. I feel that way about Amnesia often. I don’t want to make it unless I can make it a well as I imagine it – on the other hand I don’t think I can make it as well as I imagine it.
Soul Brother’s one of those projects that’s just outside of my ‘comfortably achievable’ zone. I’m still not sure if I can finish it, but that being said I’ve done a little more work on it. It’s slow and laborious though, partly because of the unfamiliar level design ideas I have to deal with as a result of the mechanics. It took more than a day to make the room below this post, believe it or not (ok I was tired, the week after my wedding to the lovely Kanako Byrne, neé Koseki… We had a lovely little do last week, ending up punting down the Cambridge rivers with almost all my favourite people in the world, and plenty of champagne.)
Anyway, I’ve almost finished level 2/5 (there will be around 20 screens in each, as well as three new creatures, except the last level – which I won’t reveal yet as it could be considered a spoiler.) Here’re the money shots:
I’m sorry folks, I don’t think Soul Brother’s gonna make it to your computer. I’m closing down operations for the time being. There’s just too much other stuff going on in my life. I’m sorry to disappoint anyone who was interested!
Jasper
So, thanks to the feedback of a select few talented game devs, the game is really taking shape. It’s gonna be a little bigger than expected, but that’s ok – I get to work on it so little what with getting married next month that it never feels like a chore!
I have a solid demo finished now, but still think it’s too early to release. Want to polish the basic mechanics until they shine. So far the feedback has been fairly good, so I’m excited about it. It might just be that the people I have shown it to like that kind of game though, haha.
Anyway, here’s another sneaky shot of it (actually a bit out of date, I’ve dropped the bottom rainbow for clarity):
It should be out within two months hopefully.
Meet Soul Brother. This is just something I’m working on as a kind of filler (need brightness to break up the darkness of Amnesia)…
It’s done for an imaginary computer that was like a ZX Spectrum, but with a programmable 8 colour palette and no ‘colour-clash’ (the 2 colour per 8×8 tile limit)… although features colour-clash of a whole different kind… behold:
To be released soon!
Greatly enjoying my new Wacom Bamboo. It’s white and feels like writing on paper. You’ll gave to forgive my inexperience with it, though: but anyway, here are a couple of sketches for Amnesia Stories (working title for prequel series.) You can click to enlarge them…
New location...
Floorman (early sketch)
Here’s a shot of the current state of things. Been refining the look, and heading in more of a painted direction.
I’m probably going to do this in stages… Perhaps there will be a series of small (freeware) vignettes, each giving a preview of a bigger chapter in the final game, which I’ll make if I feel these are popular enough.
[Click to enlarge]
Either way, after another period of doubt, I’m back at it and more focussed than ever!
This is my ongoing project I first came up with the story for about six years ago. I’ve tried and failed to make it many different ways before, most of the reasons came down to having an immense amount of assets to produce.
Version 1: BlitzMax Pure Point’n’Click Adenture
I wrote the full engine for this including a windows GUI for the editor and a script language you could enter with code highlighting etc. The problem was animation… I could do a walk cycle fairly well, and render characters out of poser and use Max for the backgrounds, but the animation was beyond me in Max. Left it to simmer.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=mEZ3oLn78Nk
Version 2: XNA Survival Horror
After Soundless Mountain II I hoped I could use some of the apparent popularity of it to launch an indie career with a similarly designed game. I felt I could adapt Amnesia really well to this style. I had a great like-minded artist to work with, Phil Duncan on monsters and environments, and the mighty Dock (Tumbledrop / Sweatdrop Studios) to help out with portraits. But I didn’t really know where I was going with it at the time, partly because I still hadn’t fully figured out how it could survive as a survival horror but keep the story in-tact. But again, it wasn’t so much that but the fact that I felt the need at the time still to make it commercial, and that to me meant writing off a lo-res look we initially mocked up like the one above.
I learnt XNA and then we decided to use 3D models all because I wanted shadows. This was at the edge of our skills though (Phil & I certainly as Dock was busy with Tumbledrop – and rightly so!) Phil’s a great 3D modeler, but not yet that experienced with animation. In the end the prospect seemed too daunting, especially combined with other life pressures. Put on hold again.
Version 3: Lo-Stress, Lo-Fi BlitzMax Hybrid
I’ve begun again. I can’t help it. I keep coming back to it even though right now I have a really cool game coming on the iPhone that I really have to finish.
Above is a shot of the new tech I’m using for it – a way of applying a sort of 2D dynamic pixel-lighting. It comes out really organic and it feels more ‘magical’ than doing it by bump/normal-mapping, even if it is quite time consuming. I keep getting effects I don’t quite expect.
Anyway Phil is excited and has already started putting our main baddie into the new format. I’m excited too!
The idea this time is to keep it simple, hence going back to the BlitzMax language. So I’ll be working on it on and off, and I’m just trying not to consider money or anything like that.
Anyway just thought I’d share the story with you guys, I’ll keep you posted on it… For now, please enjoy this short video of the new lighting in action (it’s a really poor quality video, I’m afraid):
Besides making Rockabilly Head, I’ve allowed myself to have a month or two’s break, while I went through the stressful process of getting my fiancee over from her native Japan with official visas and whatnot, and found a nice new house for the two of us. It’s been good for me though, as I’ve had a lot of time to think about where I’m going with iLoveWar [far less likely to be the real title now, as the story’s taken shape.]
I’ve finally decided on the balance of gameplay I want to achieve. When I look at similar-genred games, such as the Advance Wars and Fire Emblem series’ I see them veering either one way or the other – the AW-like chess-style pieces (closer to RTS, really) which are completely chosen by the player, or the FE-like story-based characters, which makes for a far more puzzle-based experience. FF Tactics seems to go for this too.
I want to somehow combine a strong story with the flexibility and strong ‘building strategy’ of a unit-based game. I think I’ve finally got there! Basically, all units will be of one of six classes (two variants of three types), some will be ‘Character’ types and some will be ‘Drone’ (or AW-style) types which are like characters with a low level-cap who all look the same (I have a good way to explain this in the story, too which is important to me.)
Anyway, I’ve got lots of solid design done which I’m keeping in a proper document, with a semi-formal schedule and everything, now that I have the talented miss Selina Dean (from UK manga collective, Sweatdrop Studios) to help me with portraits and background art.
Here’s a mockup with a portrait based on one of her sketches to whet your appetite. It’s showing our lead character, Mono:
You can download Rockabilly Head here: Rockabilly Head [PC / OSX Download!]
I thought I’d do an analysis of my own game, as it sprung up so quickly I almost didn’t know what it meant*.
* but then i changed my mind.